ILLINOIS

POLLUTION CONTROL BOARD

January

24,

1985

CITY

OF TUSCOLA,

Petitioner,

PCB

84-446

ILLINOIS ENVIRONMENTAL

PROTECTION

AGENCY,

)

Respondent.

CONCURRING OPINION

(by

J.

D.

Dumelle):

My reason for concurring lies in the language

of the

majority

opinion criticizing the

~mayor~s

contingent

commitment” for com~

pliance.

As

a former city manager and an assistant

to two other

city

managers,

I

do

not believe an Illinois mayor

could alone

commit

his city to a massive multi~milliondollar

project.

At

the

very least,

a council vote would be needed and,

quite possibly,

a referendum also,

The least costly alternative appears to

be $3,293,700 in

total

cost,

The

present

federal grant fund

ratio of 55

would

amount

to approximately $1,811,535,

But grant

funds may well

be

made

available by Congress as cities all over

the United States

face needed Clean Water Act projects at full

local cost.

It

would be unreasonable to require a full cost commitment until

the

fate of additional

federal funding

is known.

Tuscola did not clearly state why

it

needed

this four-month

extension to its original variance,

It probably

was needed to

adequately consider the engineering report

filed

October 24,

1984,

some two months after the original variance

expired.

Since

it

did not clearly state

its reason,

I concur

in the

dismissal,

As July 1,

1988 approaches,

the Board will see

more of these

grant—related problems.

In some cases,

small

cities

may just not

be

financially able to finance the full cost of

these needed

sewage plants.

We can only wait and work

toward

adequate mechan-

isms

to finance these infrastructure needs.

e

62~415

---

2

I,

Dorothy M.

Gunn,

Clerk

of

the Illinois

Pollution Control

Board,

hereby certify that the above Concurring

Opinion was

sub-

mitted to me on the

~/‘~

day of

,

1985.

Dorothy

Illinois Pollution Control Board